MUSKEGON, MI – A Muskegon abortion clinic was a “filthy mess” due to poor housekeeping, forcing the city to shut it down Dec. 26, Muskegon Public Safety Director Jeffrey Lewis said Thursday.

Lewis said the clinic's owners told him the facility at 863 E. Apple Ave. won’t be reopening. However, Dr. Robert Alexander, who operates the clinic, declined to comment on its future on Thursday.

Lewis said Alexander contacted the city fire marshal Thursday to discuss alleged code violations and reported he has no intention of reopening Women’s Medical Services at 863 E. Apple Ave.

That closes the case as far as the city’s concerned. Lewis said the city never issued formal citations for the alleged code violations, preferring to talk with Alexander to determine his intentions first. The doctor’s stated intention not to reopen takes care of the matter, Lewis said.

“The doctor was very cooperative with us,” Lewis said.

Alexander, reached by phone Thursday evening, said that many in the Muskegon community have voiced support for his clinic. He said he received about 60 calls alone on Thursday.

"At this point, the community is telling me they want me to stay," Alexander said. "People in the community are calling constantly and asking, 'Where can we go?'"

“It’s just ridiculous,” Alexander said Monday. “At this point, they (anti-abortion activists) win. At this point, I’m not going to open back up.”

Lewis released a redacted list of what city Fire Marshal Major Metcalf called 11 “violations noted during my assessment,” performed after Muskegon police investigated a reported break-in at the clinic.

The eight alleged violations of the city’s fire code -- including containers of hazardous materials not stored in cabinets -- centered on what appeared to be generally poor housekeeping for any type of medical clinic, Lewis said. All could have been remedied fairly easily had the doctor chosen to reopen the clinic, he said.

“It was a filthy mess,” he said. “Just the overall housekeeping was not that which you’d expect a clinic to be.”

Lewis did not express an opinion on whether intruders may have caused any of the reported problems. “We’re investigating to see if any of this was caused by the (illegal) entry,” Lewis said.

Three other alleged violations were blacked out because they did not refer to anything that falls under city ordinances, Lewis said. He said those were referred to the Muskegon County Health Department and the state of Michigan.

County Health Director Kenneth Kraus said he was not told of any violations that constituted an imminent health hazard, the only thing that would have fallen under the county’s jurisdiction.

State health officials could not immediately be reached for comment Thursday afternoon.

“Poor housekeeping: That was the theme of the whole thing – a state of organization that did not exist. Overt poor housekeeping,” Lewis said. “This location was not suitable to continued operation” as a medical clinic of any kind, he said.

For example, cabinets appeared "very dirty" and rusted, and ceiling tiles were discolored from longstanding roof leaks, Lewis said.

Alexander reasserted that the clinic was in "pristine condition" when he left for the day before the break-in on Dec. 26.

"Every time they inspected the building, it has passed inspection," Alexander said. "The building was broken into."